


an audience of one

by ThanksForListening



Category: NCIS
Genre: F/M, Fluff, but its mostly Tiva centric, family fic, mostly - Freeform, takes place after they've reunited btw
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-19
Updated: 2019-09-19
Packaged: 2020-10-21 13:23:30
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,064
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20694245
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThanksForListening/pseuds/ThanksForListening
Summary: "There was something about an empty apartment that Ziva found incredibly calming. Maybe it was the promise of a new beginning, the lack of any baggage, physical or metaphorical. Maybe it was the way the wood floors seemed to shine under the sunlight coming through the windows, making the room glow in the soft light of the DC sunset.Or maybe it was the fact that she was there with Tony and Tali, and that as of a few days ago, the place was officially theirs."Tony, Ziva, and Tali after the dust has settled and life begins to go back to normal (whatever that's become)





	an audience of one

**Author's Note:**

> oops im back already with another tiva fic. mostly fluff with a teeeeensy bit of angst.

There was something about an empty apartment that Ziva found incredibly calming. Maybe it was the promise of a new beginning, the lack of any baggage, physical or metaphorical. Maybe it was the way the wood floors seemed to shine under the sunlight coming through the windows, making the room glow in the soft light of the DC sunset. 

Or maybe it was the fact that she was there with Tony and Tali, and that as of a few days ago, the place was officially theirs.

“Alright,” Tony said, looking down at his phone. They all sat on the floor, the three of them surrounding a nearly empty pizza box. “The Paris furniture and extra boxes are on their way as we speak. We should be sleeping in beds and cooking real food in no time.”

“But I like eating pizza on the floor!” Tali said, and Ziva couldn’t help but laugh. 

“I do too, kid, but we can’t show Ima our insane cooking skills if all we eat is pizza, can we?”

“Oh, I would love to see what kind of meals you’ve been living off of these past few years,” Ziva said with a smile, and Tony gave her that look, the one with fire in his eyes and unspoken suggestions in his smile. She’d spent far too long ignoring that look. 

“Hey, little T,” he said, eyes lingering on Ziva before they turned to Tali. “Why don’t you go look through the couple of boxes we do have and see if you can find anything fun you want us to do tonight?”

She nodded, running off into what would soon become her bedroom. Ziva waited until she heard the door shut before turning toward him. “Little T?”

“Yeah, I don’t know,” he said sheepishly. “Not my best work, I’ll admit.”

“No, it’s cute.” She smiled. “Where did it come from?”

“Her name never sounded right coming from me.” She frowned at his words. “It’s just,” he added quickly, “you always had a way of saying it that just, I don’t know, elevated it. I could never match your accent, and it felt...sacrilegious, to have her hear it in any way other than the way it was meant to be heard.”

“Oh.” 

“It’s kind of become a running joke, now,” he said with a soft smile, staring at the room Tali had entered. “I’m always coming up with more and more ridiculous nicknames. I think she likes it, especially now that she has someone to show her the beauty of her actual name.”

“Glad we’ve got that established, then,” Ziva said. She hadn’t thought this far, hadn’t wondered how parenting with someone else would be, now that she’d lost so much time. What if her and Tony only worked as a maybe, as something better in idea than in practice? What if they knew how to be together, but not how to raise a child? What if they’d both gotten used to single parenthood, and adding another person sent the whole thing crashing and burning, and her coming back only did more damage than good? What if her very presence was just the start of her ruining the lives of the two most important people in the world?

“You know, we really did do everything out of order,” Tony said, knocking her out of her own head and back into the moment. She looked at him, and could have sworn that he could hear just what thoughts were running through her head. Even after all this time, he still knew her better than anyone. 

“We did, didn’t we?”

“I mean, we went from years of pining, to me chasing you halfway across the earth, to a magical one night stand ending in a goodbye that I’ve definitely seen in a Hallmark movie before, to a kid? And a kid that we’ve never actually raised together?”

Ziva laughed, even though her heart sank at the thought of all their wasted time, of her own self-destructive choices. “You know,” she said, ignoring the list of missed opportunities that haunted her memory. “I don’t think you’ve ever asked me out.”

“Come on, I definitely asked you out at least once in the past decade.”

“Nope. I distinctly recall that the few times we…spent time together, way back when,” she said with a coy smile, “it was me who made the first move.”

“Well, I’m not sure I would consider anything we did from that first summer as a date,” he said quietly, giving her a look that made her want to make him remember just how they’d spent their time all those years ago, that summer after they’d first met. And a couple summers after that. And that last time in Israel.

“Either way, the fact is that I believe you, Anthony DiNozzo, owe me a date.”

“Where do you want to go? On this momentous first date of ours?” He laughed, then said, “I’d take you anywhere, you know,” and he was still smiling but he'd lost the joking tone he spoke with earlier. “I’d fly back to Paris if you wanted to.”

“I would love to see the opera,” she sighed. “Would love to take Tali there.”

“I’ll book tickets as soon as we get WiFi installed.”

“Are you sure?” 

“If we wait too long, we won’t be able to get good seats, Ziva.”

“No,” she shook her head. “I mean...with us, and with Tali now, there’s so much more to think about.”

“...And? What does that have to do with the opera?”

“What if we try...this,” she said, motioning between the two of them, “and it doesn’t work?”

“You really think that’ll happen?”

“Of course not, but we don’t have just ourselves to think about anymore, Tony. What if we crash and burn, and Tali is left to suffer the consequences?”

“We won’t let that happen.”

“I’m just saying,” she said. “I think we should ease into this. Move slowly.”

“Slowly?” He laughed as if he couldn’t believe the words coming out of her mouth, and she never wanted to hear that sound ever again. “This hasn’t been slow enough for you?” 

“That’s not what I meant—“

“Because I think we’ve spent enough time waiting, and I for one—.”

“You think I don’t want you?” She asked, and he froze, mouth open, words dying on the tip of his tongue. “More than anything, I want to dive head first into this, into us. But I would never forgive myself if we try and rush something and end up ruining it, and then Tali gets stuck with parents who can’t stand each other.”

“You know that’s the last thing I want,” he said, voice serious and smile gone.

“Good. Me too.”

“But Ziva, we can’t just tiptoe around one another again. I don’t think I’ll survive it, being this close to you without getting to touch you. Without getting to kiss you. I can’t hide my feelings anymore, not even if I wanted to.”

“Neither can I,” She said, “which is why I have absolutely no idea what to do. How to do...this.”

“Yeah,” he sighed, laying back until he was fully extended on the hard floor. She followed suit, and for a moment they stayed there, side by side, the sounds of the city softly surrounding them 

“Hey Ziva,” He said after a moment. “Why did it take us so long? If we both knew how we felt, and we both suspected the other felt the same, why didn’t we ever do anything?”

“I don’t know about you,” she said, eyes still staring up at the ceiling, “but I know that I valued your friendship too much to risk losing it at the chance of something more. I thought, better to have part of you than none of you.”

“I felt the same exact way.” He turned to face her, and she turned too, until they were laying on their sides, faces inches away from one another. “I mean, I’ve never had anything quite like what we had, and we didn’t have anything more than a — well, than whatever it was. Friendship, I guess, but it always felt deeper than that. I couldn’t act with you the way I did with anyone else, because I knew almost from the moment I met you that you _weren’t_ like anyone else.”

“_Almost_ from the moment you met me?”

“Well, let’s say that first conversation left me a bit off guard. Didn’t know quite what to feel back then.”

“Oh, you mean when I caught you having phone sex?” She whispered in his ear, and she laughed at the way he still blushed, even after all this time. 

“Hush with that language,” he whispered back, and she didn’t know how it was possible for them to get closer, but here he was, lips just a breath away from hers, and she found it nearly impossible to keep her eyes away from them. “There’s a child in the house.”

“Our child,” she whispered back, and they stayed there, neither of them so much as breathing. She felt as if time stood still, slowed down all around them. Her gaze drifted from his eyes down to his lips and back up again, and he arched an eyebrow just slightly. The invitation was there, and she knew he’d wait for her, leave the choice in her hands. All she had to do was jump. 

The sound of footsteps running down the hall broke the moment, sent them each leaning back just slightly. She blinked, as if waking up from a dream, and he did the same. 

“Aba! Look what I found!” Tali yelled, and Ziva’s breath disappeared at the sight of her. She could hear Tony respond, but it was as if she was underwater. His voice was muffled beyond recognition, the words themselves indistinguishable. The only thing she could see was Tali, practically glowing under the light coming through the window, smiling at her like she’d put the sun in the sky, twirling and giggling as she did. 

“You put her in ballet lessons?” She whispered, trying to hold onto the tears in her eyes. She felt Tony put his hand in hers, but she couldn’t look away from her daughter, in pink ballet shoes and a poofy tutu that seemed to engulf her tiny frame. 

“She’s pretty good too, I think. Although, this was always your area of expertise.” 

“Thank you,” She said, forcing herself to turn toward him. 

“You know, since the moment she came to DC, every decision I’ve made has been done after wondering what you would do. You may not have been here, but don’t think you haven’t had a part in raising our child, Ziva.”

She nodded. What words could she possibly say to describe the weight that seemed to slowly fall off her shoulders, the pride and gratefulness that flowed through every cell in her body, the relief and ease and love that nearly overwhelmed her, in the best possible way? No language she knew had any arrangement of letters that could properly express the sentiment. 

He squeezed her hand, and she wondered whether she’d ever get used to the way he always knew how to read her mind, how to look into her eyes and see everything she was and everything she hoped to be. 

He let go, but only to fiddle with his phone. “Alright, you ready Tater Tot?” He asked, and Ziva turned back to look at Tali, standing in front of them expectantly. “Do you remember the moves, or do you want me to do it with you?”

“You do it with me!” She laughed, and he turned to Ziva, gave her a look that she recognized from every movie he’d ever shown her, the one that only two parents, two halves of a whole, could give one another. She’d spent years wanting to share that look with someone, to share it with him. She pinched herself as he stood up and clicked play on his phone, because everything about this moment had come straight from her wildest, most hopeful dreams, the ones she used to keep herself going in the years she spent alone. She watched as they danced, the music echoing off the hardwood floors, the whole house becoming their stage in a performance for an audience of one.

**Author's Note:**

> if u liked it please tell me i love that shit. also shoutout to whoever came up with the headcannon on tumblr that tony uses nicknames with tali i didn't mean to steal it i just loved it so much that i couldn't let it go (also sorry i don't remember who you are). 
> 
> hit ME up on tumblr though @ thanks--for--listening if you want. id like to think im fun u might have a good time.


End file.
